64th Academy Awards

The 64th Academy Awards were presented March 30, 1992 at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, Los Angeles. The show was the third consecutive to be hosted by Billy Crystal. When Jack Palance won Best Supporting Actor for his performance as Curly in City Slickers (which also starred Crystal), Palance's acceptance speech began with the joke "I crap bigger than him (Crystal)" -- a reference to a similar line in the film. Palance also used some of his speech time to prove his virility by performing one-handed push-ups. In mock retaliation for Palance's comment, Crystal peppered the remainder of the telecast with jokes about Palance performing spectacular feats. As a result, Crystal won an Emmy for hosting the show, although he later (in the documentary Get Bruce) credited Bruce Vilanch for providing him many of the Palance jokes.

The Silence of the Lambs won the five major awards out of seven nominations, becoming only the third film to accomplish the feat of winning the "Top Five", after It Happened One Night (1934) and One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975).

This year's ceremony made Academy Award History as Beauty and the Beast was nominated for Best Picture, the first time an Animated Feature Film was bestowed with such an honor. The Picture garnered a total of six nominations in four different categories, eventually collecting two awards for its Music (Best Original Score and Original Song, for "Beauty and the Beast"). An animated feature wouldn't be nominated for Best Picture again until 2009. It also became one of the few films to be nominated for Best Picture despite no nominations in any directing, acting, or writing categories.

The Silence of the Lambs was the last Best Picture winner to take home only major Oscars (no tech or music awards) until A Beautiful Mind.

The Irving G. Thalberg Memorial Award was presented to George Lucas by the crew of the space shuttle Atlantis during the STS-45 mission, which also included an actual Oscar statuette aboard the spacecraft.

The Academy Honorary Award for Lifetime Achievement was awarded to Satyajit Ray. It was one of his favorite actresses, Audrey Hepburn, who represented the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences on that day in Calcutta. Ray, unable to attend the ceremony due to his illness, gave his acceptance speech to the Academy via live video feed in his home.

Thelma and Louise marked the last film as of 2012 to have 2 nominations in Best Lead Actress (or in either lead acting category).

John Singleton becomes the first African-American to be nominated in the category Best Director.